Keep Breathing
by iSackettEcho
Summary: The moments when Oromis is tortured and broken, and how he became the Cripple Who is Whole.  Experiment with the 1st and 2nd POV.  Crossposted on SF3.
1. Part One

Part One

I keep dreaming the strangest dreams. I know that I am dreaming, but I can never remember where I am from, where I lay down, or where I am sleeping. In my dreams, there is no beginning or end, just the black confines of the moment. There is naught but the golden thread slivering here and there.

The golden thread slithers about, meandering under the emerald trees, leaping over the ragged cliffs, riding the gushing rivers – running, slipping, gliding until it converges upon an elvin maiden. She dances haughtily, naked beneath the glaring sun. The golden thread surges forward, ensnaring her in its grasp. Then, oddly, it grows, covering her, encircling her until she is clothed in silken golden splendor.

She dances, encompassed in gold. The sun falls and the pale moon rises. The gold appears almost silver beneath the bewitching light of the night. Then, saddest of all peculiarities, her healthy pale skin turns to ashy black. She screams in horror, her golden clothes undulating and throbbing in brilliant golden array, as though the golden thread slowly yanks and unravels the life from her.

Her face turns ashen, her cheeks hollow, her eyes a vacant black. Her skin cracks. Fissures run courses down her face and over her breasts. She howls, as if in pain, and shatters. Shattered like glass across a stone floor, though I thought she would instead blow away like ash.

At the end of my dream, all that remain are the scattered shards of her remains and the golden cloth crouching over the black glass, crying over her its golden tears.

You always told me I had such strange dreams, didn't you? If only I could remember who you are, to whom it is that I speak.

Perhaps it is you, this golden thread traversing here and there, enticing me to follow. Perhaps you are the lady enshrouded in gold. But no, that cannot be, for your voice is decidedly masculine while she is enticingly feminine.

Yet, somehow, when I think of gold, I think of you.

Who are you, this magnificent voice thundering in my mind?

When I think of you each time I dream, I wake. Such a tragedy is waking, when the waking is to the nightmare.

And in my waking nightmare, I see ghoulish creatures standing over me, their drool dripping into my eyes as their putrescence causes my stomach to flip and flutter with nausea.

Cool iron clamps my hands to the rough, splintered wood table beneath me. I struggle to move my body, but other restraints that I cannot see or feel on my skin constrain me. I am constrained in a living hell and wish that I could awake.

Only, this is the waking world, isn't it?

A fire blazes by my head. I smell the acrid smoke of a forge. A hot poker is thrust into my view. Words that I do not comprehend are uttered by the monsters standing over me. When I do not answer, the hot poker is shoved into the crevice between two ribs.

I scream out in agony. I pull against the iron braces, trying to free my hands to reach for you, only I do not know where you are.

I do not even remember who you are.

Why am I, in the haze of my great pain, reaching for you?

And why are you not here?

As I scream, I wish you were by my side. As I gasp in pain, I wish you would tear these monsters to shreds. As I gurgle on my own blood, I cry out for you to just come and save me.

But when the torture is finished, when I begin to fade and sob for your not coming, I hear you—somehow I hear you from across a very great distance.

_Breathe_, I hear your grand voice whisper. _Just breathe._

Because you commanded it, I take a ragged breath, and keep on breathing.


	2. Part Two

Part Two

I fall into another dream, a darker sleep.

I dream that I lean over the dank stones, peering over the moss covered ledge into the depths of a dark well. I am looking for something. I am waiting for someone.

I hear a rustle of grass behind me, the unmistakable snapping of a twig underfoot. I whirl around to confront my trespasser, who dares intrude on my solitude.

It is but a child, a precious elvin child. His laughter comes to my ears, light and sweet, like the faint tinkle of bells. "That is not how you find your future," the child says, laughing darkly – tones of derision and mirth.

My future? Is that what I am looking for? I ignore the graceless child's rude manner and ask, "Are you a seer? Can you see the future and tell it to me?"

The child giggles like a bemused baby, his dark curls tumbling over his forehead. "No, silly elf. The well is the seer. You must bend over backwards and look into the well with a mirror, and over your left shoulder, you shall see your future."

I glare at my hands, irrationally angered that I have no mirror to hold over my head as I look down into the deep black waters of my fate. The child tsks, and a golden mirror magically appears in his hands. I scowl at him in envy.

"That," I point out scornfully, looking down my nose at the mischievous elf child, "is a primitive human belief."

He laughs with irreverent pleasure. "It is a human well." He grins, and where there should be teeth there are fangs. No elvin child at all.

Spinning on his heel, he tosses the golden mirror with the flick of his wrist. I jump with glee and snatch the golden mirror out of the air before it can fall to pieces upon hard packed ground.

I leap to the side of the well, eagerly leaning over backwards to read my fortune in the murky waters beneath my mirror.

Just as I lean further in for the best view over my left shoulder, the child grasps my right leg and flips me over, sending me head over heels down the well.

I plunge down the well, falling and falling and falling, the air becoming heavier and more putrid the farther I fall. Above me the child's eyes glow gold as he fades away far above me. No elvin child at all, but a werecat! I hear his laughter fall down on me as further and further I sink into the darkness of the well.

I land, hitting hard into the ground. I spread my hands beneath me, looking for support, but there is no ground! With no light to guide me, no earth or sky to show me the way, I am lost in a black sea of nothingness.

Is this the future? Does this mean I am done for?

You always told me I had such strange dreams, didn't you? If only I could remember who you are, to whom it is that I speak.

Perhaps it is you, those golden eyes peering down at me in the darkness of the bottomless well. Perhaps you are the golden mirror, desperately trying to reveal to me a better view of my future. Perhaps you are the werecat boy. But no, that cannot be, for somehow I know that you are quite large, and he was so delicately small.

Yet, somehow, when I think of gold, I think of you.

Who are you, these magnificent golden eyes burning in my mind?

When I think of you each time I dream, I wake. Such a tragedy is waking, when the waking is to the nightmare.

And in my waking nightmare, I see ghoulish creatures hovering before me, their drool dripping onto the blood splattered stone floor as my eyes burn and sting from the salt of my sweat.

Cold iron clamps hold my hands over head, and I am suspended in the air, dangling two feet above the ground. The rough iron cuts into my wrists, my weight gouging my own flesh. My own blood drips from my hands onto my forehead. I struggle to move my body, but my feet are bound by rope. It is a useless endeavor to try and free myself.

I am constrained in a living hell and wish that I could awake.

Only, this is the waking world, isn't it?

I hear the tinkling of metal against metal. I smell the putrid scent of my torturers as they prepare their next torment. A barbed metal hook is thrust into my view. Words that I do not comprehend are uttered by the monsters standing over me. This time, I remember what they want, why I am being tortured—but this brings no relief, for I can give them no answer. When I do not answer, the barbed hook is shoved into the tender muscles next to my spine. I gasp and whimper in pain. The barb is yanked out of my flesh, tearing and mutilating my once flawless back. The hook is plunged into my back again, and I scream the cry of unadulterated misery.

I wail a lament of the dead—for hopefully soon, that is what I will be. And in the end, I moan in agony, for my strength is depleted. I twitch my wrists against my iron braces, trying to reach for you, only I do not know where you are.

I do not even remember who you are.

Why am I, in the haze of my great pain, reaching for you?

And why are you not here?

As I gasp in misery, I wish you were by my side. As I moan in pain, I wish you would tear these monsters to shreds. As flesh is torn from my body, I cry out for you to just come and save me.

But when the torture is finished, when I begin to fade and whimper for your coming, I hear you—from somewhere far away, yet not so far away as before.

_Breathe_, I hear you whimper. _Just breathe._

Because you command it, I take a ragged breath, and keep on breathing.


End file.
